Loving Yourself - Step 10

To review:   The nine steps covered so far.
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1. To admit we are powerless over what others think of us.
2. To come to believe that a Power greater than ourselves loves us regardless of anything we do.
3. To make a decision to see ourselves as that higher power of unconditional love sees us.
4. To Make a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves.
5. To Admit to God, to ourselves, and to another human being the ways we limit loving ourselves.
6. To face these limits, work through our fears in order to love ourselves.
7. To humbly ask that greater power to open our hearts to the love in our lives.
8. To make a list of all the times we have harmed ourselves and forgive ourselves for them
9. To learn to identify when we feel shame and guilt for what we have done to ourselves, and change it to thoughts of what we have done well, what actions we can take to make positive changes in our lives from this point on.
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Step 10:  To take personal inventory and when we are self-critical, to promptly admit it and change.

Step 10 is the last step when we are creating our lists of the times we have harmed ourselves.   Step 9 was learning to identify when shame and guilt come up when looking back on those issues and to correct them.   Step 10 is learning to prevent self-criticism as new experiences happen.   It is being proactive, instead of letting those experiences become self-critical memories.

It is only by having gone through the other 9 steps that this step even becomes possible.   It is also very difficult.   Why?   Because none of us want to face when we are being self-critical.   I know it is ironic, but it is difficult to face the fact that we are self-critical without being self-critical.  Yet, we can do the same things we have done in the earlier steps.   We can choose to accept honestly, when the first inkling of self-criticism hits, that we are experiencing it, and can choose to change our thinking.

Like step 9, sometimes we build up the habit of categorizing experiences immediately in terms of negative self-thoughts and positive self-thoughts.  It is sometimes immediate, happening in a second.  We know immediately when we have said or done the wrong thing and we do everything in our power to apologize to ourselves and others before too much time has passed.

For example, I was talking with a friend and we were talking about getting chocolate and I said that it was a good mood-altering substance, realizing only then that my friend was bi-polar and might take that statement in the wrong way.   I could have reviewed this statement I made over and over again, blaming myself for my own stupidity over and over.   However, by stopping and realizing that I made a mistake, apologizing, and moving on, the self-criticism has no chance of becoming a reinforced cycle of criticism and shame and guilt.  Also, there are times that I think that I could have done something different, I could have treated myself better, better food or more exercise.   I stop and see that these are valid points, but that I have the opportunity to change my present behavior to be closer to what I desire for myself.   I see what needs to be changed (1st critical thought) and then choose to change it (Step 10).

Step 10 is really a consciousness raising step.  It is retraining our mind to no longer equate negative self-thoughts with self-criticism, but rather with acceptance, choice, and forgiveness.